Cedar Point. July 6, 2002

haux

We got to the park right about when it opened. We purchased our tickets and decided to hit Raptor in the back seat first.

Raptor plain and simply rocks. We didn't have a wait at all and I love how there are no air gates on the ride to slow capacity. I won't elaborate on Raptor here, my ride review will tell all. 10/10.

We went to Millennium Force and got our hands stamped to ride between 12 and 1.

Mantis was our second coaster on the list. We went for the back row after waiting about 10 minutes. The drop is pretty fun, but you can feel the brakes. This ride has incredible forces into the vertical loop and the oblique loop. The finale is nice and twisted and my legs didn't hurt after this. Mantis was AZ RIDER's first stand up coaster. 6/10.

After that, we cruised around the park to hit some rides that AZ RIDER hasn't done. We went to Mean Squeak, er, Mean Streak. Yep, this coaster does squeak through a lot of the course. AZ and I rode in the front while Coaster Boy rode in the back. The brakes down the drop reminded me of Hercules at Dorney Park. Those brakes made the ride crawl through every turn. I was ready to be bored out of my mind when I found out that this ride has airtime! Yes, Mean Streak has airtime! Three spots of it in the front, in fact! How insane. When that happened, I could only scream, "airtime? What?" I was flabbergasted! This woodie is not too great, though. It's really slow and lackluster. Good thing we only waited two trains. 3/10.

Next up was Gemini. Of course there was no wait, even though they were only running the red side. As we were hopping in the last car, they opened up the blue side and we could race. The first circuit didn't work and blue was way behind on the lift hill, but the next two circuits (Yeah, I rode again. With no wait, I take advantage of it if the ride's any good.) ended up racing. I rode again in red the second time and blue the third time. In the turns I slapped hands with the opponents, which I have never done before. That was a lot of fun but my mom got a little mad since we were doing that. The only things I don't like about this ride are that it's a little rough when it hits the peaks and valleys of hills and that the red side had the trim on before the helix, allowing blue to win every time. Gemini's nice, classic fun. 6/10.

Magnum XL-200 was next. I was a little nervous about this one because when I rode it last it was pretty rough. I got on in 20 minutes and rode in the back seat. Yep, it was rough. The trims before the turnaround suck badly. I just can't see how this thing was voted the number one roller coaster for so many years. It's not even top ten quality in my book. 5/10.

It was time to ride Millennium Force now. With the hand stamp, we pushed ahead of an hour of traffic and got on the ride in the front seat in about 30 minutes. Good as always. Millennium Force does not let down. 10/10.

We went to Blue Streak and waited for the back seat. Well, we didn't wait since there was only really a one-train wait. This is a fun little coaster with nice airtime. 6/10.

We decided to watch a show after that, so we watched "Hooray for Hollywood: The Sequel." I say it was better than the first one, which we saw in 2000. I especially liked that Harpo Marx was in this one, but he sang (Harpo's character is always mute in their films).

We split up after that and I went to ride coasters while the others went to watch karaoke and shows. I went to Wildcat, which I rode three times today. Wildcat's a lot of fun and has some really good Gs in it. No brakes are on until the very end, either. Yay! 6/10.

I decided to give Iron Dragon a try in the back seat. One train was roped off in the back, so I had to wait five minutes. This ride is really slow, even in the back. It's a little rough, but the turns through the trees are fun and smooth. I see why they call it "Draggin' Iron." It does. 3/10.

Next would be two rides on Power Tower down and one on PT up. Down is the scarier of the two for me since drop rides just terrify me to death. The first time on down, I was facing the inside of the ride, so I had a few towers blocking my view. The second time I was facing outward towards Maggie. It's kinda neat being that high above Magnum knowing you're going to fall all the way down. I looked straight down because I'm a freak like that and then we fell. Man, oh, man was this ever scary. I didn't hold on, either, because it's just better to do it that way. Whee! I love drop rides and this was the tallest I've ever ridden. PT down - 8/10. PT up - 6/10.

I went to Woodstock Express after that and before I boarded, some grandmother asked if I could ride with her granddaughter who was too short. I said yes and she paid me five bucks for it! I really shouldn't have taken the cash, but she slipped it to me folded up really small and I just stashed it in my pocket. It was a fun little ride and my on ride photo was hilarious. There's this tiny girl next to me and then BAM! There's this 19-year-old psycho with this huge grin on his face. Haha! 3/10.

After that, I went walking around and I bumped into Hector, a moderator from Thrill Network. We chatted for a while and then I let him get back to work.

I went back to MF since I have to get two rides per day now. I was going for the front seat, but the wait was a little longer since they had the front of the yellow train roped off. Once I got in the station, they took the red train off the tracks, so the loading for the front seat decreased dramatically. I didn't want to wait one and a half hours for the front so I chose to sit in the second row. That was nice and at the end of the ride there were splattered bugs on my wrists. Awesome!

I rode Wicked Twister again, this time in the back. This was way better than the front end. The twist backwards is truly, wicked. 7/10.

I went to Blue Streak again and rode in the back. Same as before. Fun, airtime, blue.

Then it was on to Disaster Transport. When I rode this back in 2000, it was horrible. It just seemed to creep through the entire ride and I was not impressed. This time around was pretty cool. After a half hour wait I got on in row four. This ride was a lot more fun this time around. There are parts where you're shrouded in total darkness only to come into this room full of lights that look like stars or something. That was pretty fun and worth a re-ride if there was no wait. 5/10.

I had to meet the rest of my crew now, so I headed over to our meeting place by Wildcat. We sat down and watched the Summer Spectacular. I think I liked the one in 2000 more because it had coasters in it. This one was mostly patriotic September 11th stuff. Yeah, I see why they did that, but I'm sorta tired of the whole patriotism thing now. The country's back together, terrorism sucks, yadda yadda. The songs were good, though, and I like lasers and fireworks.

This was a really good day at the park, if you ask me. We stayed until practically closing which was at midnight. This park is truly amazing and I can now safely say that I favor Cedar Point over Six Flags Magic Mountain. Maybe it's the atmosphere. Maybe it's the plethora of rides (CP has about eight billion flat rides to SFMM's three or four). Maybe it's the roller coasters. Either way, I like Cedar Point more than SFMM. The employees seem happier, too. They've also got really good cheese fries! 10/10!

----------------- I was asked to describe X in one word. The word? -- OhmygoshwhathaveIgottenmyselfintothisisthescariest thingintheworldhelpmeIamgoingtodieAHHHH!!!

StandUpFan

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 12:57 PM

RIGHT ON about the Magnum! That coaster has a lot of history behind it and I think that's how it continues to rank high on a lot of lists. I haven't rode in a couple of years so I can't say how the new trains are, but when I rode it gave me a worse headache than anything else I'd ever been on, including woodies. And it had been #1 for 11 years straight! I actually started a thread on that long ago, but most of the responses were people trashing me for either not liking it or daring to step on their coaster idol.

Good to see there actually ARE other members of CoasterBuzz who think the Magnum is overrated. Note that I'm not saying it's a bad ride, just overrated.

----------------- PLEASE READ: This post wasn't meant to offend or anger anyone; I apologize in advance if it does. So please don't post a reply just to rant about it. :)

NJCPer

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 1:15 PM

Sorry to hear the negatives about Magnum

Magnum is the best hyper in my opinion, and has as much airtime as almost any ride I know. Maybe you sat in the wrong seats. Everyone always says it's overrated, it's rough etc, but I still keep finding myself getting off of it and saying that is still one of the best, fun, favourite rides anywhere.

Kick The Sky

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 1:23 PM

If Magnum is so good and has all this "airtime" where is the money seat on this ride because last year when I rode it I got very little airtime and a ton of roughness. I am going to the park in a week and I am very willing to give it another shot.

----------------- Bob Hansen

A proud CoasterBuzz Member

"So you think your'e really brave, gonna see the DEMONS cave. You silly dude, your'e only food, for the DEMON"

Ride of Steel

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 1:38 PM

Magnum isn't good. The only reason some people find it good is because its classic. The trains are horrible because the lapbars have barely any padding, are heavy = you get stapled, so the airtime turns into pure pain. Although it is pretty rough I don't mind it. All I mind is the painful airtime.

Millenium Force Maniac

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 6:27 PM

posted before, but somehow, my post was deleted. First of all, I don't know how any of you don't believe there's any airtime on this coaster, it has more airtime than just about any coaster I've ridden on, the whole thing's camelbacks. And standupfan, I don't know what you heard, but Magnum doesn't have any new trains, I rode it about three weeks ago, and no, there's nothing new about the trains. I'll be back to the point next week to ride my #1 steel coaster: Magnum

Chaindog

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 7:01 PM

Agreed. Magnum is also a bit moody, kinda like a wooden coaster. I've been there in the morning when it feels like it's running in slow motion, only to come back after 3:00 and find myself riding the lapbar through half the course.

But I've had some "bad" rides as well.

I think that's exactly why so many people love it. It has a ton of personality.

----------------- Without the chaindog, you'd never get up the lifthill...

CPLady

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 5:22 AM

I've had smooth rides, and rough rides on Maggie, but all have airtime. Yes, 1-3 is the ejector seat, but some people get "banged" in the thighs through the hops. My son loves Magnum, but hates the thigh banging. I agree that thick padding on the lapbars would help immensely.

Also, if you hold the lapbar, you can prevent it from stapling down on you through the ride. I've also deliberately stapled myself and found that even though you aren't "above" your seat, you still feel the "airtime" and it doesn't seem to bang as much.

I find it to be a much rougher ride in the back, especially through the pretzel turns.

It's not necessarily my #1 steel coaster, but it's still in my top ten.

StandUpFan

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 6:20 AM

MF Maniac, I was referring to the new trains it got for 2001 (I rode before then, of course). Many people have said it got new trains then, and that the trains were much less rough than the old ones with those no-padding fiberglass seats (worse than Gerstlauer's -- ouch!). Assuming that's the case I'd really love to ride it again. It could easily be one of my favorites if I didn't have to worry about the extreme pain induced by banging down on that hard seat at the bottom of each drop on the return run. For me it's a lot like the Boss -- could be great but I can't enjoy it much because I'm too busy trying to protect my back and neck from being hurt.

----------------- PLEASE READ: This post wasn't meant to offend or anger anyone; I apologize in advance if it does. So please don't post a reply just to rant about it. :)

Millenium Force Maniac

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 12:50 PM

standupfan, I don't know what you mean. The trains have always been the same. There's always been a little bit of padding on the seats, black colored. It's always been that way. I don't understand what you mean...

StandUpFan

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 1:11 PM

Hmmn... [confused] If the trains have always been the same then my info is incorrect. I was told by a few people (some in this forum) they got new trains for 2001, but I haven't been back so I can't be sure. As for the black padding, I sure don't recall padding of ANY sort being on those seats, unless hard plastic counts. But that was a couple of years ago so I could easily be wrong there as well.

This whole Magnum personality thing is something I've heard a bit about but never understood. I guess you do have to ride a lot or like it from the start to grasp that...I don't think of any coasters as having personality, not even ones that I've put in plenty of ride time on, but that's just me.

Maybe the only way to find out is to go back and ride Magnum again...guess I'll have to plan a trip. :)

----------------- PLEASE READ: This post wasn't meant to offend or anger anyone; I apologize in advance if it does. So please don't post a reply just to rant about it. :)

Chaindog

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 2:20 PM

StandUpFan said:

Maybe the only way to find out is to go back and ride Magnum again...guess I'll have to plan a trip.

That's the spirit! Just like I've got to plan trips to SFNE to make sure I still like S:ROS, Kennywood for Phantom's Revenge, Holiday World for Raven, Six Flags MM ... you get the picture. You can't take too many coaster trips!

----------------- Without the chaindog, you'd never get up the lifthill...

MDOmnis

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 2:38 PM

The trains were not new for 2001. They did however get a lot of work done on the fiberglass bodies, wheels, etc. There are a few cracks starting to develop in the fiberglass this year - they actually had to pull a train off for a day in June to fix one of them from what I heard. 2001 was a decent year for Magnum. It is running a tad rougher this year, but still awesome, especially with the trims off. Don't judge Maggie on one ride. It definitely has a personality and each ride is a bit different. Warm and windy days or evenings with the trims off are when I've gotten my best rides. I also got some good rides in the cold on closing weekend last year. If you can't handle 1-3, try 5-2 or 6-2. Still great air, but not quite as painful and actually they are both better seats for the drop because you get YANKED over! ;) In general, try to ride in the middle of a car (X-2) for a smoother ride.

Millenium Force Maniac

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 6:23 PM

thanks, MDOmnis, I guess that settles the dispute. Standupfan, what I mean is that, it's not really padding, but it's definitely not plastic, they're like black hard foam, if that's how to describe them.

Millenium Force Maniac

Wednesday, July 17, 2002 6:23 PM

thanks, MDOmnis, I guess that settles the dispute. Standupfan, what I mean is that, it's not really padding, but it's definitely not plastic, they're like black hard foam, if that's how to describe them.